A web-enabled printer is a printer that has internet connectivity. A web-enabled printer has an associated email address. A user of a computing device such as a smart phone can email a document to the web-enabled printer, and the printer will print the emailed document.
Printing to a web-enabled printer requires knowledge of the email address associated with the printer. Knowledge of the printer's email address is fine if, for example, the printer belongs to the person desiring to use the printer. However, in some situations, the person using the computing device to initiate the print job is different than the person that owns the web-enabled printer the former person desires to use.
For example, a person may be in a hotel lobby in which a web-enabled printer is located. For that person to email a document to the printer, the hotel management would need to tell the person the email address of the hotel's web-enabled printer. And once the printer's email address becomes known, the hotel management may find it difficult to control the use of the hotel's printer.